Page 10 of The Only Way Out Is Up

The end result of this process is the Clawmarks, who control all the territory around Stair #3 and claim the right to extract dues for their “services” from every resident. A modest payment and you live in safety. (Or at least safety from everyone who isn’t a Clawmark.) Rekas, among other duties, is in charge of making sure everyone coughs up on time.

He enjoys his work a little too much. Nobody likes Rekas.

“Five minutes,” he says to me. “Are you going to be ready?”

“I will if nobody talks to me,” I mutter. The idiot’s foundation fits neatly into the socket—it ought to, I’d designed it that way—but it still needs to be wired in properly. Otherwise, as I warned Star, it might get its limbs confused.

“Harsh,” Rekas says with mock amusement. “But I like to see someone working right down to the last minute. Shows persistence.”

I try to ignore him, twisting wires together between my fingers. Not as good as proper soldering, but good enough. Good enough, good enough, everything’s always just barely good enough…

“When you see that brother of yours, tell him I’m thinking of popping round to the bakery for a visit,” Rekas drawls. “The little scones he makes are really top-notch.”

He’s doing this on purpose. Just to watch me squirm. He doesn’t have a grudge against me in particular, as far as I know; this is just who he is, like a man who likes to let a junk-lizard wriggle in the trap for a while before tossing it in the stewpot. Just to show that he can, and there’s fuck-all I can do about it.

The end of the wire slips up under my fingernail, punctures the thin skin there. I yelp and swear, a drop of blood dotting the sigils.

“Oh dear,” Rekas says. “Should I summon a physicker?”

Fucker. He knows I’ve barely got the bits for a bandage, much less a physicker. I grit my teeth and twist the last couple of connections together. My runic—it’s not Star anymore—twitches. I clear my throat.

“Stand up,” I tell it.

Slowly, with none of Star’s grace, it obeys, inverting its legs and climbing laboriously to its feet. It’s still upside down, and its primary optics turn sluggishly to track me.

Good enough? No way to know. I start reattaching the armor plating.

“I’ll tell them you’re ready,” Rekas says. I can hear his mocking smile.

The space around the pit is packed, as always. Everyone loves watching runics fight; it’s one of the few forms of entertainment available for free. For those who fancy even more excitement, Clawmark bookies take shouted bets and hand back torn scraps of paper, while enterprising children shriek offers for water and mash-biscuits. The volume level verges on painful.

Each contender has a prep shed, just a metal box to provide privacy for a last-minute tune-up. Sigwork techniques for fighting runics are jealously guarded secrets, passed down through generations and kept in hidden manuals. Most of it, frankly, is bullshit, but it lends an air of mystique. When I lead not-Star outside, there’s a rising buzz of conversation all around us as experienced punters take stock of this new arrival.

It’s not my first runic fight; when I was a kid I used to clean up building palm-sized runics that would push each other out of a circle scratched in the dirt, with a quarter-bit on the line. But it’s the first time I’ve tried for serious money using Star’s combat body. It seemed like the obvious move, given how well he’s done against Twisted, but watching the idiot stutter forward one careful movement at a time, I’m having second thoughts.

I’ve watched plenty of fights, though, and the competition looks much the same. Simple foundation sigils produce simple behavior, and nobody in the Heap can afford anything better. The winner usually comes down to sigwork, who built a better body, and that’s something I have more confidence in.

If only I’d been able to afford a few more RESISTS…

“Friends!”

Rekas steps into the “pit,” which is actually just a circle marked on the stone. We’re in a courtyard between two large buildings, out of the view from the main market square; runic fighting isn’t exactly illegal, but the Clawmarks prefer to keep their activities out of the Arbiters’ eyes as much as possible. The big enforcer gives the crowd a broad smile.

“Betting is closed.” His eyes find the bookies in the crowd, who obediently shut their ledgers. “Fighters, to the pit!”

I guess Rekas isn’t much of a showman. People part to let me and not-Star through. I wait at the edge of the pit, while the runic keeps walking until I mutter a command to stop. Looking at it in the glare of the work-lamps overhead, I can see all the little problems: the dull blades, the hasty new legs, the back panel that’s never fit properly. I wonder if they’re as obvious to everyone else.

My opponent takes another moment to appear, and I entertain the brief hope that I’ll win by forfeit. Then the crowd parts, and a heavyset, scowling woman ushers a runic over the boundary. It’s a squat, ugly thing, about half my height, with four stumpy legs and a broad circular shield of dull metal covering its front.

Looks tough straight on, I send to Star, passing along the image of the runic. He can’t see when he’s reduced to a gem in my pocket, which annoys him to no end. Have to get around that shield somehow.

[Derision: hmph. If it were me, I would flip over it with grace and elegance.]

I doubt the idiot can manage that.

[Condescension: then perhaps a sidelong approach is within its limited capabilities.]

“Fighters ready?” Rekas says, retreating toward the edge of the pit. “Begin!”